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The ultimate argument to save our species can be made by a single symphony. The tortured genius who wrote it had been going stone-cold deaf for nigh on two decades.

It could’ve been no other way.

Beethoven’s 250th birthday (December 16th) has sparked a global eruption of shock and awe.

Amidst the ghastly demise of our deranged Caligula, the adulation for Ludwig edges into outright worship.

And rightly so. Each of Beethoven’s nine symphonies is a major masterpiece. His concertos, sonatas, overtures, rondos, quartets, and more are nearly all uniquely immense.

The fugues he wrote at the end of his life are complex, demanding, indecipherable … either centuries ahead of their time, or channeled — Jimi Hendrix style — from some other planet.

A humanist to his core, Beethoven thrilled to the original ideals of the French Revolution. He dedicated his Earth-shattering third symphony to Napoleon as their bearer, but angrily renamed it after Bonaparte declared himself “Emperor.” Beethoven’s one opera (Fidelio) is an ode to feminist empowerment that exalts a daring woman who defeats a brutal tyrant.

Vermont’s only prison for women is, by all accounts, a ghastly place. The facility was never intended to be a prison. The facility was never intended to house women. Built as a men’s detention center in the 1970s, the facility is inadequate to provide what any reasonable person would consider adequate health and safety conditions for as many as 160 incarcerated women.

The Vermont women’s prison, formally known as the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility (CRCF) in South Burlington, came into being in August 2011 as a political effort to reduce the state budget pushed by then Governor Peter Shumlin, a military-industrial Democrat who also supported basing the nuclear-capable F-35 in Winooski. Shumlin pushed both projects with grand promises of benefits that have yet to be fulfilled.

It is essential that Democrats control the Senate. For that to happen Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff must win both the seats in the U.S. Senate in the run-off in Georgia on January 5, 2021. 

If Mitch McConnell remains as Majority Leader of the Senate, it will be impossible for the Biden administration to rescind many of the draconian laws passed during Trump’s administration and to pass progressive legislation. 

If both Warnock and Ossoff win the Georgia seats, Vice President Harris, who will be President of the Senate, will break ties.  Charles Schumer will be Majority Leader and Democrats will chair all of the Senate committees.  

Sometimes a couple of nominations convey an incoming president’s basic mindset and worldview. That’s how it seems with Joe Biden’s choices to run the Office of Management and Budget and the State Department.

For OMB director, Biden selected corporate centrist Neera Tanden, whose Center for American Progress thrives on the largesse of wealthy donors representing powerful corporate interests. Tanden has been a notably scornful foe of the Democratic Party’s progressive wing; former Sanders speechwriter David Sirota calls her “the single biggest, most aggressive Bernie Sanders critic in the United States.” Who better to oversee the budget of the U.S. government?

When I was a student revolutionary, I attended a debate between a communist and liberal in Manhattan circa 1972. When the latter complained that workers didn’t strike in the socialist states one of the reds in the audience shouted out that this was because “The workers own them!”

In Dear Comrades! seasoned Soviet/Russian director Andrei Konchalovsky poses the question: What does happen when the workers go out on strike in a (purportedly) workers’ state? Russia’s official entry for 2020’s Best International Feature Film Academy Award is based on an actual labor action in June 1962 by the industrial proletariat at the city of Novocherkassk, back in the USSR.

It is convenient to surmise that Israel’s current political crisis is consistent with the country’s unfailing trajectory of short-lived governments and fractious ruling coalitions. While this view is somewhat defensible, it is also hasty.

Israel is currently at the cusp of a fourth general election in less than two years. Even by Israel’s political standards, this phenomenon is unprecedented, not only in terms of the frequency of how often Israelis vote, but also of the constant shifting in possible coalitions and seemingly strange alliances. 

It seems that the only constant in the process of forming coalitions following each election is that Arab parties must not, under any circumstances, be allowed into a future government. Decision-making in Israel has historically been reserved for the country’s Jewish elites. This is unlikely to change anytime soon.

The notion that the COVID-19 pandemic was ‘the great equalizer’ should be dead and buried by now. If anything, the lethal disease is another terrible reminder of the deep divisions and inequalities in our societies. That said, the treatment of the disease should not be a repeat of the same shameful scenario.

For an entire year, wealthy celebrities and government officials have been reminding us that “we are in this together”, that “we are on the same boat”, with the likes of US singer, Madonna, speaking from her mansion while submerged in a “milky bath sprinkled with rose petals,” telling us that the pandemic has proved to be the “great equalizer”. 

“One major difference between GOP and Dems is that [Republicans] leverage their right flank to gain policy concessions and generate enthusiasm, while Dems lock their left flank in the basement [because] they think that will make Republicans be nicer to them.’”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez nailed it once again, tweeting her frustration and despair a few days ago when the Democrats yielded to the Republican Party as the pandemic relief package was being negotiated. This has been the essence of the party’s attitude for virtually half a century, aided by the mainstream media and everything else that embraces words like “centrist” and “moderate” and “bipartisan.”

In other words: Stand for nothing!

December 8 came and went as if it was an ordinary day. For Palestinian political groups, it was another anniversary to be commemorated, however hastily. It was on this day, thirty-three years ago, that the First Palestinian Intifada (uprising) broke out, and there was nothing ordinary about this historic event.

Today, the uprising is merely viewed from a historic point of view, another opportunity to reflect and, perhaps, learn from a seemingly distant past. Whatever political context to the Intifada, it has evaporated over time. 

The simple explanation of the Intifada goes as follows: Ordinary Palestinians at the time were fed up with the status quo and they wished to ‘shake off’ Israel’s military occupation and make their voices heard. 

Being a careful proofreader, I provided some volunteer assistance to Mayor Pete:

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Pete Buttigieg <info@wintheera.com>
Date: Wed, Dec 16, 2020
Subject: Thank you